Mikael Persbrandt to leave BECK series

Swedish actor Mikael Persbrandt is set to leave the Beck TV series after having featured in it for almost twenty years.

Persbrandt is known for his role as Gunvald Larsson – Martin Beck’s sidekick – which was added by the original authors: “Beck and his colleague Lennart Kollberg were friends; they were very close, always thinking in the same way. It was too cute, so we thought we would find a more challenging workmate for him,” Sjöwall told Sweden’s DN.

One of the lead characters, detective Gunvald Larsson – detective commissioner Martin Beck’s sidekick – was added by the original authors: “Beck and his colleague Lennart Kollberg were friends; they were very close, always thinking in the same way. It was too cute, so we thought we would find a more challenging workmate for him,” Sjöwall told Sweden’s DN (source: Cineuropa).

This isn’t to say we won’t be seeing Persbrandt anymore – he has played a UN Secretary General in Jadotville, and SS officer in Alone in Berlin, and has also joined Guy Ritchie’s historical adventure Knights of the Roundtable: King Arthur, which is due for release in February 2017.

Emma Vestrheim is the editor-in-chief of Cinema Scandinavia. Originally from Australia, she is know based in Bergen, Norway, and attends major Nordic film festivals to conduct interviews and review new films.